Overheated Arctic sign of climate change 'vicious circle'

November 24, 2016

Ice cover at the top of the globe shrank to its smallest area in 2016—some 4.14 million sq km (1.6 million sq miles)—on September 16

Freakishly high temperatures in the Arctic driven by heat-packed oceans and northward winds have been reinforced by a "vicious circle" of climate change, scientists said Thursday.

Air above the Polar ice cap has been 9-12 degrees Celsius (16.2 to 21.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above average during the last four weeks, according the data from the Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI), which tracks hourly changes in Arctic weather.

And during several days last week, temperatures above the North Pole were a balmy zero degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit), a full 20C (36F) above the levels typical for mid-November, said Martin Stendel, a DMI climate researcher based in Copenhagen.

"This is by far the highest recorded" in the era of satellite data, starting in 1979, he told AFP.

"What we are observing is very unusual."

At this time of year, open Arctic ocean exposed by sea ice melted away in summer should be freezing again, with thousands of square kilometres icing over every day.

But that has not been happening, at least not at the same pace, said Stendel.

"Not only was the ice not growing as it would normally, there was further melting due to warm air coming in," he explained by phone.

The US National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that sea ice extent in October was the lowest on record, some 6.4 million square kilometres (2.5 million square miles).

Ice cover at the top of the globe shrank to its smallest area in 2016—some 4.14 million sq km (1.6 million sq miles)—on September 16.

Several factors have caused the Arctic to overheat since late October, say scientists.

The most immediate are warm winds sweeping up from western Europe and off the west coast of Africa.

"The winds carrying this heat is a temporary—and fairly unprecedented—weather phenomenon," said Valerie Masson Delmotte, a scientist at the Climate and Environment Sciences Laboratory in Paris.

Only since Thursday have they abated.

Mirror effect

A second contributor is the record-strong Pacific Ocean El Nino that tapered off earlier this year—after pumping a couple tenths of a degree of added warming into the atmosphere.

But reinforcing these periodic, if powerful, drivers is the biggest one of all: global warming, experts agreed.

About 80 percent of solar radiation from the Sun bounces back into space when it falls on white snow and ice

"The long-term decline in sea ice in the Arctic can be attributed to climate change," said Ed Blockley, lead scientist at the UK Met Office's Polar Climate Group.

The January figures are in, and Earth's string of hottest-months-on-record has now reached nine in a row. But NASA said January stood out: The temperature was above normal by the highest margin of any month on record.

Arctic sea ice appears to have reached a record low wintertime maximum extent for the second year in a row, according to scientists at the NASA-supported National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) and NASA.

At the end of its melt season Arctic sea ice extent stood at second lowest in the daily average and fifth lowest in the monthly average, according to scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of ...

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67 comments

They forgot about the negative feedback which is lake effect snow in Siberia. Which means less heat absorbed next spring, reversing the conditions.Also, there is no mirror effect at work right now, since it's late fall therefore night in high Arctic.

Is there a historic record of particulate accumulation on the Arctic snow and ice, from Alaska to Greenland, that a dirty snow effect increases melt? I can think of two countries whose recent industrial development, without adequate scrubbers, has contributed large volumes of pollution. Methane hydrates evaporation from permafrost Pingos and mud flats in the Beaufort Sea are no doubt contributing to the climate change in the Arctic, but the natural sources of green house gases seem to be ignored by the AGW proponents.

i've been chasing this one, WP had a headline 36 DEGREES WARMER IN ARCTIC!!! , its been cold in resolute for a month and the 'RED BLOB !!!!! ' temp 'anomaly' is centered right over resolute. and i have been to resolute and farther north so i know exaclty where it is.

i've been chasing this one, WP had a headline 36 DEGREES WARMER IN ARCTIC!!! , its been cold in resolute for a month and the 'RED BLOB !!!!! ' temp 'anomaly' is centered right over resolute. and i have been to resolute and farther north so i know exaclty where it is.

WP?

36 degrees F or C?

Red blob?

Resolute is just one data point at 76 degrees north. It's also currently showing 5C above average temperatures and is forecasting even higher temperatures next week according to you linkhttps://weather.g...c_e.html

here is the temp @ n pole right now , the headline is screaming 36 above normal so it should be -62 does that sound right ? google has no result for nov. norms . the avg mean winter temp is - 40 , so they are saying it should 20 below normal.

here is the map with the red blob being shown over resolute and other areas,,

here is the temp @ n pole right now , the headline is screaming 36 above normal so it should be -62 does that sound right ?

No, because you are mixing up Centigrade and Fahrenheit, and why are you looking at today's temperature when the article you linked to was dated eight days ago? When the article says "Presently, the North Pole is recording temperatures 36 F (20 C)" they are referring to the 18th not today.

here is the map with the red blob being shown over resolute and other areas,

And here is a map showing the location of Resolute, if you compare the two you will see that the 'red blob' is not over it.

Outgrow your fixation on the folk who bested you, "otto". As you admitted, you are here using a phony name to play your "games", as you put it. Your own words.

But you have become so nasty in that role, I think it has tapped into a very nasty Id. Are you aware of your out-of-control emotional posts? Are you cognizant that it betrays your character, not mine, the person you attack?

Yes, we have been through this all before, your insistence we all look into psychopathy. It is a cry for help. A scream.

I think we both had a point , it was cold normal in resolute and there was an odd weather system over the pole . But ithink the article was alarmist , no mention of siberian cold on a google search and looking at the historical weather data around the pole I can't see a trend. News has always been used for propaganda and recent events have been a reminder. The establishment feels they have to motivate an apathetic and sometimes frozen public hence we have one sided stories with blazing hot anomaly maps. Meanwhile any talk of real solution to environmental problems like , say, population control are beyond consideration. Maybe war with Russia will solve that.

Meanwhile any talk of real solution to environmental problems like , say, population control are beyond consideration

this aint the first time you brought this up - so who dies first?

one of the biggest problems that i have with this type BS comment is that:you don't' truly believe in your statement - you post it for shock value and to make a stand on an outrageous solution that isn't viable

this is obvious in that you, yourself, refuse to act upon your own beliefs

repeating it doesn't do anything for you or your delusional BS crap movement

you want to assert yourself over others and that is all, so either get the education that allows you to be some kind of leader or act upon your beliefs. either way it will stop you from posting nonsensical delusional solutions that are as well thought out as a 5 year old's to-do list

How about living simply in an efficient house with garden, roof PV, and an EV?

and again, sloganeering doesn't help the situation, especially when you can't take into consideration that some people just can't afford to live your personal lifestyle

the poor cannot afford to "rebuild" or to drastically alter their lifestyle that is quite literally hand-to-mouth and paycheck to paycheck in too many cases

so quit proselytizing your perspective as the only possible solution unless you are personally going to pay for the restructuring and renovation of others life

people like you are the reason we have the political divide on this issue anyway- you never produce facts for your argument- you link subjective articles for "evidence"- & you think everyone is capable of living the lifestyle that you, personally, live because you think it is cheap (it aint)

"so quit proselytizing your perspective as the only possible solution unless you are personally going to pay for the restructuring and renovation of others life"-----------------------------------------

Only possible solution? Every situation is unique. Even you know that. And we are early adopters and thought others would like to hear the results of real installations and situations. This one worked out. But systems and grid operators change rules, and I want to be independent if necessary.

Cap'n - what snoosebaum is saying is that he has this comfortable delusion constructed in which global warming and anyone who recognizes it are all alarmist, and that humanities woes instead must all be confined to issues whose resolution is highly unlikely. This enables the delusionist to do whatever he or she wants, while salving their conscious. Snooze is very unlikely to abandon the delusion he has so much invested in.

Snooze is very unlikely to abandon the delusion he has so much invested in

@Zzzzyeah, that is typical of most of the anti-agw crowd for some reasonwhat always astonishes me is their adherence to dogma over logic, science and actual evidence (be it studies or just plain observation)

i thought one who recognizes the potential of GW would be alarmist by definition , but it seems they [ the most concerned ] have trouble believing it enough to alter personal behaviour , hence flying about on jets examples below, canadians the worst it seems sending 383 ! on Paris vacation re; solutions , how about a national solar program ? , never even mentioned

you mean you've never seen it mentionedbut it is out there, and here is just one example i know for a fact (near my brothers home)http://www.seia.o...carolina

lets start with the above solar program you mention: who pays for the solar panels? gov't? or you?you can already get rebates from various sources

then lets talk ability to actually use them on houses:we can out here, but in lots of neighborhoods you have rules that forbid it (with things like wind turbines or clothes lines) because of the perception of value to high dollar investments (the house and neighborhood)

so what needs to happen?education to shift the public perception about power consumption and source

i had to get back to this: why do you think people have problems altering their personal behaviour?for starters, you're blaming this on the "alarmists", so to speak... it's not their fault, reallythe problem lies in companies and people like the following: http://www.drexel...nge.ashx

these people are actively promoting false information and statements to create a public confusion - the public actually thinks there is a global warming controversy in the US

there isn't

there is the science, which overwhelmingly states what is being said

and then there is the people who want to undermine said science to protect their financial cash cows

stop believing and following the political arguments and stick to the source material - the science

It says -17.5 , not 0 or 36 / 20 above avg . Yes I'm sure theres lots of studies showing its hot everywhere , sorry I'm just a bit sceptical after watching tony Hellers presentation showing how they altered the record . On the other hand I live near glaciers and can see them melting. Then again try this , look at squamish bc on google earth , find mt garibaldi to the east. On top are the remains of a glacier , follow downthe valley to town , all the way, now in the forest are the moraines , that's melting over a long period I would think a few centuries. Glaciers were receding here at the turn of the century but were high in the mountains.

So your argument comes down to a conspiracy theory where all the worlds climate scientists conspire for over forty years in order mislead the public to ensure themselves further funding. Obviously all the world leaders must have been in on it as well, after all don't you think G.W.Bush would have exposed the fraud if he had known? Unless of course the NSA and CIA are also colluding with the scientists in order to further the interests of their lizard overlords.

Or maybe the reanalysis of climate data is described in published papers that have shown them to be an improvement in accuracy and/or coverage.

Without referring to a grand conspiracy, ask yourself why none of the people making these claims have published a paper proving the fraud, and why nobody has been prosecuted for misuse of federal grant money?

To reinforce their message of catastrophic global warming, they were prepared to manipulate and massage data in highly dubious ways. Although replication of research results is a key part of the scientific method, they sought to avoid granting legitimate requests for their data and computer code, including requests filed under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), and were willing to destroy data and correspondence.